


no other than god

by boleynqueens



Category: 16th Century CE RPF, The Tudors (TV), Wolf Hall (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-05
Updated: 2017-05-05
Packaged: 2018-10-28 08:37:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10827696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boleynqueens/pseuds/boleynqueens
Summary: the once and future queen reflects.





	no other than god

**Author's Note:**

> "trust in those who offer you service, and in the end, you will find yourselves in the ranks of those who have been deceived." -- anne boleyn, tudors
> 
> "people should say whatever will keep them alive. you would, wouldn't you?" -- anne boleyn, wolf hall

Have you ever been loved by someone powerful?

I have.

The feeling of it is engulfing, intoxicating. It wraps you in a cloak of satin, tight enough to feel safe, smooth enough to make shivers dance up and down the curve of your spine: to be held by one who has the world at their command. To hold  _them_.

And to have them turn against you? Is as terrifying as their love was thrilling.

And you must [ _laugh_](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/160173080162/when-the-queen-had-been-taken-into-custody-by-sir) despite the terror-- for when have you heard of this, except in a story? [Arthur's love of Guinevere and the flames that engulfed her despite it](https://www.spectator.co.uk/2013/08/anne-boleyns-last-secret/); symbolic retribution of the burning passion she shared with Lancelot...

They have said that I have lain with several Lancelots; but in truth I have lain with none...but then, lies often make more sense than the truth, and so we rest our laurels on them.

 

* * *

 

Still-- who could say it was not love?

Many will, I suspect. 

Isn't  _that_  easier to believe? Isn't it less terrifying?

 

* * *

 

What else is it like, how else can I explain…

To believe you have lost them is drowning, except your grief and panic does not belong only to you.

And you want scream, to snarl, to snatch your fear close to your chest-- no! _This_ is _mine_! You believe you love him, but none, none, _none_ of you love him as I do!

You cannot despair losing what you have never had.

 _You_ have never run your fingers through his hair, you have never felt his adoration upon your lips, you have never felt the caress of his hand against the curve of your stomach, never felt his smile just for you as he touches where you carry the child that is his and yours, his and yours alone (and the future of the world, but that, too, is yours, as it shall be inherited by that which is yours)--

None of you know!

None of you shall _ever_ know.

And then you have to share the relief, too, [when he recovers from the fall](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/henry-viiis-jousting-accident-24th-january-1536/). And it is the last thing you want; to share.

When he has not awoken for an hour, you sort through every memory, every shared thing like a magpie as you feel your very heart plummet:

The snow dusting his eyelashes at Eltham, the nightmares he had about Arthur as a boy, his words to Mountjoy at seventeen (he wishes he was more learned; said that without learned men we would not exist at all, said to me he has tried to improve his own learning and the number of learned men at court every year since-- _although none are near as learned as you, sweetheart_ ), how his father would not let him joust, how his hands shook when he asked if I loved him, how he crumpled the paper threatening excommunication in his fist…

These are mine, and mine alone.

* * *

 

No one else can tell my story but me.

Although many will try.

* * *

 

Even if they believe I did not love him at the beginning ( _who, indeed,_ ** _could_** _love a man who loved liked_ ** _this_** , they may whisper behind their open hands--as if _any_  of us knew!

Perhaps More, that otherwise fool, who spoke of him as a lion, circling:

 _"You are now entered into the service of a most noble, wise, and liberal prince: if you will follow my advice, you shall in counsel giving unto his grace ever tell him what he ought to do, but never tell him what he is able to do…_ [ _for if the Lion knew his own strength, hard be it for any man to rule him_ ](https://books.google.com/books?id=ca1mbuiPJ9MC&lpg=PA230&ots=W-ApP4knfO&dq=if%20the%20lion%20knew%20his%20own%20strength%20thomas%20more&pg=PA230#v=onepage&q=if%20the%20lion%20knew%20his%20own%20strength%20thomas%20more&f=false) _."_

Well, Cromwell…did you think  _this_  was what he  _ought to do_?)

How could they suspect I loved him not after Elizabeth?  _No one_  will doubt I loved her, and she is at least half of him...if I hated him, would I not have pushed away such an incessant reminder? If  _he_  had hated me for her, would I not have even more so?

But I always pulled her  _towards_  me, my daughter, [the downy-haired piece of me](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/160306308347)\-- they will write what they will; but even those that hate me shall know that.

* * *

 

[To wit...if he hated me,  _truly_  believed me to be guilty of all accused, for the rest of his years, if he never wished to remember me...why did _he_  keep her so close?]

* * *

 

They will try to craft it into a lesson, a cautionary tale: trust not in love, lest it turns.

Trust not in kings. Trust not in their advisors ([they do not trust them themselves, not truly](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/160317724189/missbumphead-he-has-always-rated-anne-highly-as)). Trust not in men. 

[Do not laugh at men](http://68.media.tumblr.com/741d5a2d370eac5560bb82a5093fd893/tumblr_oojip7ARxO1qckb0uo8_r6_250.gif), for they may kill you for it.

[Do not laugh at men, for they may die from it](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/160135633862/lochiels-30-april-1536-the-queen-asked).

Trust not in the flowers of May. Trust not in fireworks, in the gold and glitter of Calais...

* * *

 

[To Calais, our triumph.](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/27-october-1532-anne-boleyn-makes-dramatic-entrance-banquet-calais/)

[From Calais, my executioner.](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/resources/q-a/writing-on-execution-sword/)

[From England to France, my life began as a girl.](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/151535856242/it-was-a-long-journey-the-longest-she-would-ever)

[From France to the journey to England, it began as a wife. ](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/12-november-1532-henry-viii-and-anne-boleyn-are-homeward-bound/)

From France to here, it ends my life.

Sometimes history circles us in the cruelest fashion, no?

* * *

 

Trust not in gifts, in letters, in crowns. Trust not in hearts drawn over names, trust not in sacrifices made, trust not in marriages, promises, your own name:

 _'_[ _God favours me_](http://www.sheknows.com/baby-names/name/anne) _'_ \-- if  _this_  is God's favor, then His favor is the coldest wind I have ever felt-- does God's favour feel like this for others?

Does it to Mary, refusing to sign her father as closer to God than her, than the man in the tall hat?

Does it to Henry, signing the warrant for my death?

Does it to Jane, with the warmth of his lap pressing into the skirts of her gown?

Did it to Katherine, to be crowned after winters of waiting on a beautiful summer day? To lie cold and ailing in bed twenty-seven years later, as she drew her last breath?

* * *

 

I outlive the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella by only four months. They will laugh at this.

I do not even remain free [for four months after this](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/2-may-1536-the-arrest-of-queen-anne-boleyn/), but just shy-- this, too.

[I  _am_  his true wedded wife](http://www.historyextra.com/feature/tudors/why-did-anne-boleyn-have-die), even those that bend the knee to Rome must know this now-- for she is gone.

And I will follow, shortly.

She was queen for twenty-four years. I was queen for an eighth of that time. They will laugh at this, too

The daughter had to outlive the mother. 

And so shall mine-- they will call this justice.

 _My_  mother will have to survive her daughter and son-- they will call this tragedy.

* * *

 

Henry survived his mother at twelve. 

His father at seventeen-- when  _Elizabeth_  is seventeen, she will just as tenacious as her father, just as bright a flame, just as much a lion.

Skirts that unfurl like the wings of a crow will remind them of me. A smile that unfurls like a long-awaited promise will remind them of him.

[She will be a girl that craves apples](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/160240990260/all-the-evil-in-the-world-god-took-and-locked-in). She will grow into a woman that craves [that which is forbidden](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/159356655577/kat-ashley-was-so-distressed-by-the-damage) (like me).

 

> Like _me_.
> 
> Like you, Henry.
> 
> Like you for me. Like me for you
> 
> Like Eve; the first woman who fell (will she teach me how)?
> 
> Like Adam for Eve...the first man who let her.
> 
> Did  _he_  teach  _you_?

Endlessly dark eyes that know more than what is said aloud-- mine, mine,  _mine._

* * *

 

Eyes like the words she uses to describe herself:

_Video et taceo... I see, but say nothing_

What _could_ she say?

> _"_ [_How haps it, Governor: yesterday my Lady Princess, and today but my Lady Elizabeth?_  ](https://books.google.com/books?id=d6XuwqdQH34C&lpg=PA19&ots=nN8i0dOB6S&dq=yesterday%20my%20Lady%20Princess%2C%20today%20but%20my%20Lady%20Elizabeth%3F&pg=PA19#v=onepage&q=how%20haps%20it&f=false) _"_

Pride that cannot be swayed-- ours, ours, ours.

[ _Semper eadem...Always the same._](http://www.elizabethi.org/contents/profile/arms.html)(Henry's promise to me, not kept: '[ _For I am yours, forever_](https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/resources/anne-boleyn-words/writing-of-anne-boleyn/) _'_ )

* * *

 

Henry told me that he was deprived of his mother as a boy by God, all for the labor of another heir. His mother, the person who was dearest to him...

 _"_[ _For never, since the death of my dearest mother, hath there come to me more hateful intelligence..._](http://nerdalicious.com.au/history/elizabeth-of-york-and-her-kings-henry-viii/) _"_ (Is it so for Mary? For Elizabeth? An intelligence 'most hateful'?)

He told me this with soft tears, in the light of the hearth, my hand held in his, a kiss to my forehead given with such fragile tenderness: 

_I would be loath to lose you in such a way, I could not bear it._

[Later, when he feared I may die in the same way, he prayed I would not.](http://boleynqueens.tumblr.com/post/142309430432/peremadeleine-for-some-time-after-the)

But now he shall take the mother of his mother's namesake, away from her...

> _God and my right._
> 
> _[No other than God shall take her from me.](https://books.google.com/books?id=uUV3JgWK5dsC&lpg=PA186&ots=sEO6uH8geT&dq=no%20other%20than%20god%20can%20take%20her%20from%20me%20henry%20viii&pg=PA186#v=onepage&q=no%20other%20than%20god%20can%20take%20her%20from%20me%20henry%20viii&f=false) _

Well, tell me, Henry-- are you God? Or do you simply still believe He guides your hand?

Is His true name the sword of Calais?

* * *

 

The stroke of a pen-- over paper to assure me the arrival of a skilled doctor to save my life…

 

> _["I would gladly bear half your illness to make you well."](https://books.google.com/books?id=65REAQAAMAAJ&lpg=PA306&ots=2gerZQugdW&dq=i%20would%20gladly%20bear%20half%20your%20illness%20to%20make%20you%20well&pg=PA306#v=onepage&q=i%20would%20gladly%20bear%20half%20your%20illness%20to%20make%20you%20well&f=false) _

 

[Tell me: would you bear half of this?

One day, you too will wait for death and know it is coming-- whether you wish it or not.]

 

...the years pass, and the stroke of the pen by the same hand...to assure arrival of a skilled executioner to ensure my death.

* * *

 

 How _else_ will the tale go?

Trust instead [in prophecie](https://books.google.com/books?id=dYMS5W6_Lb0C&lpg=PA199&ots=qhdci2CKv_&dq=anne%20sans%20tete%20prophecy&pg=PA199#v=onepage&q=anne%20sans%20tete%20prophecy&f=false)s, [in mad nuns](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Barton), in those that wish you ill. 

Trust in keeping your head bowed; for those who don't rise can't fall.

No one may take your pride if you have none.

Trust only the jump and fall of your own heart, pressing against your skin.

Trust it until it is gone; then trust no more.

* * *

 

I am a woman who fell.

They will see themselves in me for centuries, and so beyond my days there is this:

> _[Virtue, glory, immortality.](https://books.google.com/books?id=3cDTAAAAMAAJ&lpg=PA457&ots=Q1LgRVCnw6&dq=virtue%20glory%20immortality%20mountjoy&pg=PA457#v=onepage&q=virtue%20glory%20immortality%20mountjoy&f=false) _

'No other than God', indeed. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> yeah, idr know what...all this...Is. the result of months and months of writers' block
> 
> and i promised an update on angel after a reader vote, but this mess happened instead. 
> 
> hopefully at least someone likes it, i know first POV is not super popular. 
> 
> partly inspired by briony-larkins 'no grave can hold my body down': http://archiveofourown.org/works/9692510 ♡


End file.
